The big man rose and dusted himself off.
“You almost had me there.”
Titus ended Improved Barrier and a small personal force field formed around him. It has health equal to ten percent of the damage the barrier blocked, Kaiden thought, recalling the secondary clause on the ability.
Supermassive growled in response to Titus’ advance. At the same time, light bloomed around his right arm and it came back to life, hanging limp no longer. He looked down at it, then smiled up at Titus.
Mass x Acceleration is off cooldown!
Supermassive attacked with renewed intensity, hurling stones with Kinetic Velocity and pausing only to dodge Titus’ attempted Energy Grip every time it came off cooldown.
“He’s trying to overload Titus’ shield again,” Kaiden said, watching the assault. “Trying to open the door for a lethal Mass x Acceleration attack.”
The crowd was cheering now, sensing the end was near. Titus was hard to see in the middle of a cloud of dirt and dust as he blocked a seemingly endless barrage of hurled stones. His personal force field went down, but his shield was holding. It was going to overload sooner or later, though.
Apparently, sooner was the answer. After one last attack, the shield flicked off.
“I thought it’d last longer than that,” Thorne said, frowning. “It should have—”
But Supermassive saw it and knew the kill was near. Mass x Acceleration had dealt twenty-eight percent damage through Titus’ shield earlier. How much was it going to do when he didn’t have a shield at all? Kaiden didn’t have an answer beyond ‘too much.’
Ability: Mass x Acceleration
Supermassive lunged forward, his right arm reared back. The rocks around his body – those that hadn’t been destroyed in Titus’ attacks – rushed to form up around his fist.
Titus backed up, then looked side to side as if searching for some way to escape. But his dexterity stat was undoubtedly far lower than his opponent’s and speed wasn’t exactly the forte of shield wardens. There was nowhere to run.
Supermassive was two strides away now, committed to the attack. Committed to ending the duel. He closed the remaining distance and threw his punch.
Titus spun to face him, staring down his death, and... smiled? If Supermassive noticed it, he didn’t react. Couldn’t. He had already thrown his punch and in the blink of an eye it would obliterate Titus.
Blue light flashed to life as Titus turned his shield back on.
The realization hit Kaiden all at once. The shield hadn’t been overloaded; Titus had just turned it off. He’d baited his opponent into this attack!
Titus had just enough time to fire off an ability before Mass x Acceleration hit him.
Ability: Karmic Reprisal
Your shield glows brightly, infused with charge. You may expend X% of max charge to reduce damage from a single attack by that percentage. Additionally, your next attack deals base damage plus additional damage equal to the amount this ability negated.
Cooldown: 3 minutes.
Supermassive’s punch slammed into Titus’ shield. Another shockwave exploded outwards and Titus’ shield overloaded, but this time he only took a few percent damage.
He must have poured enough charge into Karmic Reprisal to reduce the attack by a massive amount. Which means...
Improved Volt Field lashed out at Supermassive, biting at him for a chunk of damage, but that wasn’t really relevant – not when Titus followed up with a hammer strike. A hammer strike with its attack power boosted by all of the damage that had just been absorbed through Karmic Reprisal.
Supermassive had just enough time to curse before Titus’ hammer slammed into his chest with enough force to fling him clear across the arena. His armor shattered all at once and pebbles flew everywhere. His health reduced to zero and he was dead before he even took the fall damage from his landing.
In the wake of the attack, Titus rested his hammer across his shoulder as if it were a baseball bat and smiled.
“Karma’s a bitch.”
Chapter Thirty-Nine
“That one was just showing off,” Kaiden said, smirking as he approached Titus. Judging from the glowing gobs of goop healing him, the medic had already been by.
“Turns out hitting a shield warden is a good way to get hit back,” Titus said with a smirk. He was riding high on the last victory. And why shouldn’t he be?
“Good job, though. Really.” Kaiden sat down on the bench next to the big guy. “You’re tearing it up out there. Really top-notch stuff.”
“Careful now, all this praise is going to go to my head.” He said it jokingly, but Kaiden could see there was a grain of truth to it. Titus shook his head and looked toward the end of the tunnel, where the sounds of the latest ongoing fight were strangely quiet.
“So, who’s next?” Kaiden asked, trying to refocus on the task at hand. “Who’s going to get sent on vacation in your final fight?” He looked around for a competitor but there was no one there. They were alone in the tunnel but for the medic and a few officials who were gathered up at the entrance to the arena, chatting animatedly while watching the fight.
“My next opponent hasn’t been determined,” Titus said and nodded toward the arena.
“Oh, right.” Of course it hadn’t been decided. The next fight was the final, so of course the last semi-final had to be going on now.
“All right, well, that’s unhelpful. I wanted to get a look at them, see what class you’d be up against.”
Titus shrugged.
“I’ll figure it out on the fly. Sometimes it’s good to know going into the fight, but you can’t always expect to know who or what you’ll be up against.”
Kaiden leaned toward the exit of the tunnel, listening to the sounds of the fight. Those prior had been boisterous, booming affairs. In comparison, the current one was positively silent.
“That’s strange,” Kaiden said, trying to catch a glimpse of
